Class of 2025: Kyler Gilliam completes unique degree path

By Leila Ugincius

For Kyler Gilliam, going the extra mile – miles, actually – is familiar terrain. So when he chose to spend an extra semester at Virginia Commonwealth University, he knew it would be time well-spent.

In spring 2022, Gilliam arrived at VCU after a well-traveled journey in rural Cumberland County in Central Virginia: The bus took him both to high school and to community college, where he earned his associate degree alongside his diploma. Gilliam then planned to graduate from VCU in three years.

But the extra semester he took this fall – framed by graduation this month – presented a rare opportunity: He became the first student to double-major in broadcast journalism and multimedia production in the Richard T. Robertson School of Communications, part of the College of Humanities and Sciences.

Every morning in high school, “I would have to wake up at 5:30 to get to a bus at 6. And that bus would drive us all the way down to Keysville,” Gilliam said, so he could attend Southside Virginia Community College. “I would go to school there and then they would bus us back and I’d finish my [high] school for the rest of the day.”

So it’s no surprise that at VCU, Gilliam kept his productivity in high gear.

He has served as director of the VCU InSight broadcast program, a staff writer and producer for The Commonwealth Times and president of the National Association of Black Journalists at VCU. Along the way, his writing awards have included recognition as a top sports columnist by the Society of Professional Journalists.

Sports have been a motivating force for Gilliam, and they are front-of-mind as he works toward establishing a career.

He played football and basketball and ran track at Cumberland High School, and though being a professional athlete wasn’t in the cards, he started to envision related paths.

Gilliam usually had ESPN or CBS Sports on in the background whenever he was home, and he realized that “there’s a whole ecosystem around sports, whether that’s me talking on camera, me being on the sideline, me being on the broadcast,” he said. Just “doing something around sports where I could ingrain myself and then add on communications.”

Sports journalism then became his goal.

“That really formed around my junior, senior year of high school,” Gilliam said. “I took a creative writing class. I really enjoyed that. I was like, ‘Oh, I could really do this.’”

While Gilliam started at VCU as a broadcast journalism major, he didn’t feel ready to be in front of the camera. But he embraced the technical skills he learned in his media production classes, and his goals morphed into producing video features such as those seen on ESPN’s “College GameDay.”

“They have special packages that are very thought-out concepts and heavily produced,” Gilliam said. “So it’s not like a typical news package that you get during the day, but something that you have a team working on.”

The result was his double-major in multimedia production and broadcast journalism – and his extra semester this fall at VCU.

Although Gilliam came from a rural high school — with a graduating class of fewer than 70 — he found the transition to VCU surprisingly easy. He credits the support from his community back home.

“So many people sent so much love and support over the years, either monetarily or mentally and just emotionally as well,” Gilliam said. “And I appreciate them all for that. And that’s another thing … about my community back home in Cumberland. It’s so tight-knit. And I will always represent where I’m from. I want to make sure people know that Cumberland sends out great people.”